Eldridge Cleaver

Eldridge Cleaver in 1968

Leroy Eldridge Cleaver (August 31, 1935 – May 1, 1998) was a prominent leader and early member of the militant Black Panther Party. After a long, tumultuous journey as a youth in prison to several years as a fugitive on the run he was transformed from an angry, young black "revolutionary," bent on revenge against American racism, to a born-again Christian author, and American civil rights activist.

Early Life

Born in Wabbaseka, Arkansas, Cleaver's family moved to Phoenix and then to Los Angeles. As a teenager he became involved with local gangs and petty crime. In 1957 at the age of 22, Cleaver was convicted of assault with the intent to murder.

Prison

While in prison, he wrote several essays, later to be published as the book, Soul on Ice (1968), which became very influential within the burgeoning black power movement. In the book, Cleaver acknowledged raping several white women, which he defended as "an insurrectionary act." He also admitted that he began his career as a rapist by "practicing on black girls in the ghetto." He maintains that his criminal actions have nothing to do with the views expressed in the book.

Black Panthers

Soon after Cleaver was released from prison in 1966, he joined with Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale, who had just founded the Black Panther Party (October 1966). In 1968, serving as its Minister of Information and shortly after the publication of his book, Cleaver became a candidate for President on the ticket of the Peace and Freedom Party. That same year, on April 6, 1968, Cleaver participated in a shootout with Oakland police in which 17-year-old Black Panther Bobby Hutton was killed. Cleaver was arrested and charged with attempted murder.

Exile

To avoid being sent back to prison for his part in the Oakland shootout, Cleaver jumped bail and left the country, first taking refuge in Cuba. He spent the next seven years wandering throughout the communist world, with sojourns in Algeria, North Korea, China, and the Soviet Union before finally settling in France. In Algeria Cleaver would be joined by LSD guru Timothy Leary and Leary's third wife, Rosemary. In conjunction with the radical Weathermen group, she had arranged for Leary's escape from prison. Together, they were granted political asylum; taking up residence in Algiers with Cleaver and other exiles.

In his later (1978) book Soul on Fire, Cleaver would reveal that he was supported by regular stipends from the Republic of North Vietnam, with which the USA was then at war. It was also revealed that in his trek into exile that he had been followed by other former-criminals-turned-revolutionaries, many of whom had hijacked planes to get to Algeria. The Algerians expected Cleaver to keep his proteges in line, but it became increasingly difficult, as their growing number stretched his North Vietnamese stipend to the breaking point. Cleaver organized a stolen car ring as a solution to this dilemma. His revolutionary proteges would steal cars in Europe, and then sell them in Africa. Eventually, Cleaver would have to flee Algeria out of fear for his life. Not only were the Algerian police cracking down and tracking him and his gang of proteges, but there had been gun battles as well.

Finally, Cleaver abandoned his proteges and former dreams and lived underground in France. It was there, during his months of isolation that Eldridge Cleaver experienced a Christian rebirth.

Return to America

Cleaver returned to the United States in 1975, and subsequently renounced the Black Panthers. After facing the legal process regarding his part in the Bobby Hutton incident, he was sentenced to probation for assault.

In the 1980's, Cleaver became increasingly interested in religion. After several public appearances with evangelicals, including Pat Robertson and Robert Schuller, he became disillusioned with the commercial nature of evangelical Christianity. After a brief brush with Sun Myung Moon's campus ministry organization CARP, Cleaver made his choice and was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (The Mormons) remaining a member until his death.

Politically, Cleaver became active in conservative Republican politics, endorsing Ronald Reagan for President in 1980. In 1986 he embarked on a GOP campaign to win one of California's seats in the United States Senate. (He failed to win his party's nomination.)

Also in the 1980's, it was revealed that Cleaver had become addicted to crack cocaine. In 1992 he was convicted of cocaine possession and burglary. In 1994, after nearly dying in a cocaine-related assault, Eldridge Cleaver reportedly overcame his addiction and became involved in fighting addictions with healthy nutrition.

Death

Cleaver died of prostate cancer in Pomona, California in 1998 at the age of 62. He is interred at the Mountain View Cemetery, Altadena, California and is survived by his daughter, Joju Younghi Cleaver, and son Macio Cleaver.

Quotes

• "I can understand J. Edgar Hoover, because he wasn't inaccurate. We were the most militant black organization, and we were serious in what we were going about. He said that we were the main threat. We were trying to be the main threat. We were trying to be the vanguard organization. J. Edgar Hoover was an adversary, but he had good information. We were plugged into all of the revolutionary groups in America, plus those abroad. We were working hand-in-hand with communist parties here and around the world, and he knew that. So from his position, he had to try to stop us."

• "I feel that I am a citizen of the American dream and that the revolutionary struggle of which I am a part is a struggle against the American nightmare."

• "I have taken an oath in my heart to oppose communism until the day I die."

• "If a man like Malcolm X could change and repudiate racism, if I myself and other former Muslims can change, if young whites can change, then there is hope for America."

• "In prison, those things withheld from and denied to the prisoner become precisely what he wants most of all."

• "Respect commands itself and can neither be given nor withheld when it is due."

• "The price of hating other human beings is loving oneself less."

• "You don't have to teach people how to be human. You have to teach them how to stop being inhuman."

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Cleaver, Eldridge. Soul on Ice. Delta (January 12, 1999). ISBN 978-0385333795

• ______________. "Soul on Fire." Hodder & Stoughton General Division (March 1, 1979). ISBN 978-0340228647

• ______________. Target Zero: A Life in Writing. Palgrave Macmillan (January 9, 2007). ISBN 978-1403976574

• Oliver, John A. Eldridge Cleaver Reborn. Logos International (1977). ISBN 978-0882702339

External links

• CNN Obituary
• PBS Frontline Interview with Eldridge Cleaver
• Reason Magazine Interview with Eldridge Cleaver

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